Conversation Board - Medicine and suggestion

Lucy

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Re: Medicine and suggestion
Reply #15 - Dec 26^th, 2005 at 8:27am

Spitfire

I am saddened to hear of your ordeal ...not by fire but by medicine...and I am not surprised to hear of it either. Actually, I don't think this sort of thing is that rare.

I too have been the recipient of lack of sound decision-making process on the part of the medica establishment. I haven't been to a medical person in a number of years now and I might choose death over subjecting myself to that system ever again. We in this country have a constitutional right to privacy, but informed consent is often a joke here, so there is poor medical decision-making AND violation of a constitutional right.

I have seen this sort of thing happen with other people. Some are upset, some aren't. Most people fear death so much that they choose the medical system over death. We won't solve this dilemma until we surpass our fear of death.

I'm really with you and I understand people just won't listen to you about this unless you get really angry. But the fear of death is greater for the average person than any sympathy they might have for you. So it is easy to alienate the people you need on your side to evoke any substantial change. What a dilemna.

What we need is success like Mairlyn described in order to show people there is another way. Where is that physician now? I would want that guy around if someone decided I "needed" a doc!

Part of the problem is the education system for physicians. It historically has created monsters because it has in at least some instances, literally told these people they are different and above others. This is a major part of the problem. Hopefully Matthew didn't go to a school where that was the party line. But it is still a major problem in the system.

I have to go for now but I am actually glad you posted and wish we all could discuss this openly more often as it is something that still grieves me. Thanks for bringing it up Spitfire.

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Berserk

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Re: Medicine and suggestion
Reply #16 - Dec 26^th, 2005 at 4:07pm

Some doctors have a better bedside manner than others. Just as the words of tribal shamans can function like curses, so modern doctors sometimes express their negative prognosis in a frank manner that functions like a curse which hastens the patient's death. Conversely, some Christians view faith healing as a competing alternative to medicine and consider it more spiritual to ignore medical care and instead trust their faith for healing.

The healthy partnership between medicine and spirituality envisaged by the Bible is sadly neglected by the early Catholic church. The doctor's use of placebos functions similarly to Jesus use of the power of suggestion to heal. For example, Jesus taught his disciples to anoint the sick with oil or spittle mixed with clay. Why? Because it was popularly believed that a healer's spit has magical healing power and olive oil was thought to have minor medicinal properties. Now Jesus does not believe in the power of magic. But he takes advantage of Jewish superstitions to create a mindset conducive to healing. We have lost Jesus' precise policy for when to use or refrain from such placebo devices.

Jesus had a high respect for the Book of Sirach (also known as Ecclesiasticus), which was written around 200 BC and is included in the Catholic Old Testament. For example, the Lord's Prayer is partly inspired by Sirach 28:2: "Forgive your neighbor the hurt he causes you, and when you pray, your sins will be forgiven." So we can assume that the close partnership in Sirach between faith healing and medicine meets with Jesus' approval: e. g.

"Honor the doctor with the honor that is his due in return for his services; for he too has been created by the Lord. Healing itself comes from the Most High, like a gift from a king...The Lord has brought medicines into existence from the earth, and the sensible man will not despise them...God uses them to heal and relieve pain. The chemist makes up a mixture from them. Thus, there is no end to the doctor's activities, and through him health extends across the world. MY SON, WHEN YOU ARE ILL, DO NOT BE DEPRESSED, BUT PRAY TO THE LORD AND HE WILL HEAL YOU...THEN LET THE DOCTOR TAKE OVER--THE LORD CREATED HIM TOO--AND DO NOT LET HIM LEAVE YOU, FOR YOU NEED HIM (38:1-12)."

The allusion to the creation of healing herbs is striking and almost prophetic when one considers how poorly these herbs were understood in 200 BC. The early church was negligent for not exploring creative ways that medicine and faith healing might be harmonized in a revolutionary approach to wholistic health care.

Don

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Spitfire

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Re: Medicine and suggestion
Reply #17 - Dec 26^th, 2005 at 4:30pm

Quote:

Some doctors have a better bedside manner than others. Just as the words of tribal shamans can function like curses, so modern doctors sometimes express their negative prognosis in a frank manner that functions like a curse which hastens the patient's death. Conversely, some Christians view faith healing as a competing alternative to medicine and consider it more spiritual to ignore medical care and instead trust their faith for healing.

The healthy partnership between medicine and spirituality envisaged by the Bible is sadly neglected by the early Catholic church. The doctor's use of placebos functions similarly to Jesus use of the power of suggestion to heal. For example, Jesus taught his disciples to anoint the sick with oil or spittle mixed with clay. Why? Because it was popularly believed that a healer's spit has magical healing power and olive oil was thought to have minor medicinal properties. Now Jesus does not believe in the power of magic. But he takes advantage of Jewish superstitions to create a mindset conducive to healing. We have lost Jesus' precise policy for when to use or refrain from such placebo devices.

Jesus had a high respect for the Book of Sirach (also known as Ecclesiasticus), which was written around 200 BC and is included in the Catholic Old Testament. For example, the Lord's Prayer is partly inspired by Sirach 28:2: "Forgive your neighbor the hurt he causes you, and when you pray, your sins will be forgiven." So we can assume that the close partnership in Sirach between faith healing and medicine meets with Jesus' approval: e. g.

"Honor the doctor with the honor that is his due in return for his services; for he too has been created by the Lord. Healing itself comes from the Most High, like a gift from a king...The Lord has brought medicines into existence from the earth, and the sensible man will not despise them...God uses them to heal and relieve pain. The chemist makes up a mixture from them. Thus, there is no end to the doctor's activities, and through him health extends across the world. MY SON, WHEN YOU ARE ILL, DO NOT BE DEPRESSED, BUT PRAY TO THE LORD AND HE WILL HEAL YOU...THEN LET THE DOCTOR TAKE OVER--THE LORD CREATED HIM TOO--AND DO NOT LET HIM LEAVE YOU, FOR YOU NEED HIM (38:1-12)."

The allusion to the creation of healing herbs is striking and almost prophetic when one considers how poorly these herbs were understood in 200 BC. The early church was negligent for not exploring creative ways that medicine and faith healing might be harmonized in a revolutionary approach to wholistic health care.

Don

i can tell you have never had to put you future into a doctors hands, otherwise you would never say "honor the doctor".

Doctors have no concept of honor, they merely use there paitents as lab rats, use,abuse and disriguard is there philosphy.

placebo's only work on the weak minded. People who are suseptable to suggestion. what do the rest of us have?.

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Spitfire

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Re: Medicine and suggestion
Reply #18 - Dec 26^th, 2005 at 4:39pm

Quote:

Spitfire

I am saddened to hear of your ordeal ...not by fire but by medicine...and I am not surprised to hear of it either. Actually, I don't think this sort of thing is that rare.

I too have been the recipient of lack of sound decision-making process on the part of the medica establishment. I haven't been to a medical person in a number of years now and I might choose death over subjecting myself to that system ever again. We in this country have a constitutional right to privacy, but informed consent is often a joke here, so there is poor medical decision-making AND violation of a constitutional right.

I have seen this sort of thing happen with other people. Some are upset, some aren't. Most people fear death so much that they choose the medical system over death. We won't solve this dilemma until we surpass our fear of death.

I'm really with you and I understand people just won't listen to you about this unless you get really angry. But the fear of death is greater for the average person than any sympathy they might have for you. So it is easy to alienate the people you need on your side to evoke any substantial change. What a dilemna.

What we need is success like Mairlyn described in order to show people there is another way. Where is that physician now? I would want that guy around if someone decided I "needed" a doc!

Part of the problem is the education system for physicians. It historically has created monsters because it has in at least some instances, literally told these people they are different and above others. This is a major part of the problem. Hopefully Matthew didn't go to a school where that was the party line. But it is still a major problem in the system.

I have to go for now but I am actually glad you posted and wish we all could discuss this openly more often as it is something that still grieves me. Thanks for bringing it up Spitfire.

Hello lucy,
im sure it's not a rare occurance, and im sure alot of people, are far worse off then what they did to me. I would be intrested in hearing what happened with your experience with the butchers, if not here through PM or email.

You are correct that doctors are to well protected from there mistakes, if a mechanic filled your tyre with to much air and it popped while you was driving at 70mph, they should take the blame for it, just like doctors should.

Just remember.
It's easier to find a man willing to die, then it is to find those who are willing to live in pain with paitents.

talk with you later
spitfire.

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Jambo

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Re: Medicine and suggestion
Reply #19 - Dec 26^th, 2005 at 8:23pm

Quote:

When you hold someones life in your hand, then that trust should be handled carefully, with dignity and with respect, simple concepts which doctors care nothing for.

I agree totally with that statement. But as not ALL mediums are charlatans, the same applies to doctors. Of course there are quacks who could not give a flying puck about their patients welfare, one GP at my local surgery comes into mind! He almost killed my poor mother by givin her the wrong medicine! But my own GP is a living saint, He's known my family for over 30 years and knew me when I was still a fat bulge in my mums belly and never has he done anything bad or wrong for me or any of his patients.

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Lucy Super Member Offline Posts: 1158 C1	Re: Medicine and suggestion Reply #20 - Dec 26^th, 2005 at 9:30pm just dropping by to share a link to an a rticle that is somewhat relevant http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2005/12/25/harp_in_cath_...
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Glen

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Re: Medicine and suggestion
Reply #21 - Dec 26^th, 2005 at 10:32pm

Quote:

I should mention here, that when the placebo effect has been studied in controlled experiments, only about 25% of people getting a placebo tablet and told that it would help their condition improved.

On the other hand, there's also the nocebo effect, where negative suggestion results in illness.
Quote:

Unfortunately, many of your public health programs, and commercial statements through the various media, provide you with mass meditations of a most deplorable kind. I refer to those in which the specific symptoms of various diseases are given, in which the individual is further told to examine the body with those symptoms in mind. I also refer to those statements that just as unfortunately specify diseases for which the individual may experience no symptoms of an observable kind, but is cautioned that these disastrous physical events may be happening despite his or her feelings of good health.

Seth, The Individual and the Nature of Mass Events
Chapter 2, Page 48 or 57 (depending upon the edition)

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Polly

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Re: Medicine and suggestion
Reply #22 - Dec 27^th, 2005 at 7:40pm

I strongly believe in the power of suggestion and the placebo effect. I've been treated poorly by doctors as well, but I won't say that they are all bad because I've come across a few very good ones. Unfortunately, most of them are not trained to listen to patients and are not trained in alternative therapies. But what choice do we have? When you get sick (and we all will at some point) will you sit home and wait to die, or will you run to the hospital? I bet you'll run to the hospital.

My Mom died from cancer a couple of years ago after being told it was too advanced and there was nothing they could do. I don't think we can blame doctors for this since science has not found a cure for cancer. We tried some alternative methods too but nothing worked. Sometimes it is just the person's time to go and no matter what we do, they leave this world whether we were ready for them to go or not. I don't think placing blame is very helpful and only leads to bitterness. Sure, I was very bitter after she died and had a certain hatred for doctors for not being able to "fix" her. But what am I supposed to do? Be bitter for the rest of my life?

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DocM

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Re: Medicine and suggestion
Reply #23 - Dec 27^th, 2005 at 8:52pm

Glen,

Much as I personally like Seth's philosophy, modern medicine gathered experimental data before initiating warning signs to watch for.

People with elevated blood pressure were observed for years, without any symptoms. If there BP was over 140/90 there was statistically significant risk for heart attack, stroke and kidney failure. High blood pressure was thus termed a "silent" killer, by empirical evidence and population studies.

Likewise, years of evidence showed that certain types of chest pain were the harbinger of deadly heart attacks. Before it was known for certain, men were just dropping dead between age 30 and 60 if it ran in their family. That was documented before the medical establishment understood coronary disease.

So it is not all suggestion and mass disinformation. Much of medicine is based on large population studies and controlled experiments before physicians put out large advisories.

Matthew

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Lucy

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Re: Medicine and suggestion
Reply #24 - Dec 28^th, 2005 at 9:22am

Well the courtesy part may be changing a little...by customer demand! Now to work on the other stuff....

http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2005/12/28/lessons_in_hospital_cou...

(Ps this is off topic but the article "Steinbrenner's folly" linked under 'most emailed' on the above-linked page is highly amusing to me)

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Lucy Super Member Offline Posts: 1158 C1	Re: Medicine and suggestion Reply #25 - Dec 28^th, 2005 at 9:33am How can one simultaneously practice holy perception AND pay obeisance and homage to the statistics?
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